


place onto me your burden

by noahkay



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Chroma Conclave Arc, F/M, Fluff, Greyskull Keep, Marks, vox machina - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-31
Updated: 2020-10-31
Packaged: 2021-03-09 03:33:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,414
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27297949
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/noahkay/pseuds/noahkay
Summary: An equally softKikiwas hushed through the edges in the entryway and met Keyleth’s ears as she stood from her bed. Fire suddenly burning her cheeks, she paced towards the voice and pulled the door handle towards her. As expected, the ever sweet and patient Vax’ildan, looking every bit as perturbed by recent events as Keyleth herself felt, stood before the threshold of her room. He didn’t immediately start moving or suggesting anything so Keyleth scrambled to form some coherent sentence in her already frazzled brain, hoping against all else blushing wouldn’t send Vax packing.When her lips parted as if to start speaking, Vax looked into her eyes and said instead, with the gentlest tone and an arched eyebrow, “I don’t want to be alone tonight. Do you?”Relief flooded her senses. Keyleth found the words easily this time, without the need to scramble for them first, “I haven’t wanted to be alone for a long time.”
Relationships: Keyleth/Vax'ildan (Critical Role)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 26





	place onto me your burden

Although she worked hard not to let it harden her features or darken her gaze, Keyleth’s conscience was haunted by Percy’s earlier words. _This was your ego at play,_ her friend’s voice bounced at the walls of her mind, becoming increasingly loud with each new echo as it spiralled out of reach; _You think you’re better than them_. With a firmness she hardly showed otherwise to the group, Keyleth had insisted that was not the case; she could not bear any more misplaced guilt. The last few days had felt eternal, unending suffering from all angles of Emon to the far reaches of the Fire Ashari territory and even further beyond Westrun. 

Perhaps if she closed her eyes, focused all her energy on the memory of Lady Allura’s profoundly grounding words, she would be able to drown out the sounds of death, carnage, screaming, of Percy landing a blow to her pride and ego and all that she had left in this world. What else was there to do? She had to pack. She could not crumble in front of Vox Machina again. Steeling her mind against the worst seemed like the most important thing she had to do all of a sudden. Leaving Greyskull Keep was already promising to be a grand feat of its own, nevermind having to fight her own mind in the process, as well as coming to grips with the devastating blow landed to her people. 

Keyleth paced from her belongings to her bed, making small nooks for her smaller items in the same bag she had originally left home with, all those years ago. Ruminating now on her time with the Air Ashari, the young druid drifted about the room as if she were floating, examining her belongings with a sigh before finding some space in the backpack for them. Clothes with her mother’s stitching, artefacts gifted by her father; anything reminding her of home evoked similar, slow and deliberate reactions. 

In this nostalgic trance, it would have been very easy to miss the soft rapping to her door. But Keyleth did notice it. Because her mind rushed at the noise, foreign and ripping her from her thoughts as if it were from someone as strong as Grog banging on the wooden surface. What if it were Percy? She would prefer not to see the man right now, wasn’t even sure how she could face him after their last conversation in the underground passageways of the Clasp. As an already socially awkward person by nature, this particular meeting could prove truly disastrous. 

An equally soft _Kiki_ was hushed through the edges in the entryway and met Keyleth’s ears as she stood from her bed. Fire suddenly burning her cheeks, she paced towards the voice and pulled the door handle towards her. As expected, the ever sweet and patient Vax’ildan, looking every bit as perturbed by recent events as Keyleth herself felt, stood before the threshold of her room. He didn’t immediately start moving or suggesting anything so Keyleth scrambled to form some coherent sentence in her already frazzled brain, hoping against all else blushing wouldn’t send Vax packing. 

When her lips parted as if to start speaking, Vax looked into her eyes and said instead, with the gentlest tone and an arched eyebrow, “I don’t want to be alone tonight. Do you?”

Relief flooded her senses. Keyleth found the words easily this time, without the need to scramble for them first, “I haven’t wanted to be alone for a long time.” 

They spent most of the evening before sleep speechlessly. Vax, on entering the bedroom and inspecting Keyleth’s belongings strewn over the bed, helped her to pack. As she worked to place things exactly where she wanted, in the correct pockets among other similar things, he handed her more things to put away.

In another life, Keyleth would have been horrified at the notion of a man rummaging through her personal things, but in this life she had Vax’ildan. Even though to what extent he did not know, Vax also had Kiki, and they eventually found a groove that worked for the pair to share a comfortable and productive silence until Keyleth tied up the strings of her backpack into knots and moved to leave it beside the door ready to go in the morning. Vax kicked off his boots, laid his cape over the chair by Keyleth’s desk and took a seat. Surprising both equally, Keyleth broke their shared silence as she moved back to sit on the bed. 

“Thank you for your help Vax, if it were all left to me I’d probably be packing until dawn.”

Vax nodded. 

“Are you alright?” He reached a hand across to her shoulder, “You look pale, were you able to eat at all this evening?”

“Yes I-I had some of what Laina fed everyone else. I don’t think I should have though, the children could have had more if I hadn’t.”

“Well, I’m glad you did. You’ll need your strength come tomorrow.”

“Yes, come tomorrow, and come the day after that. And the one after.” Keyleth stole a moment’s glance out the window admiring, for what it was worth, the brilliant shine of the stars that the clouds had not yet been able to obscure.

“I promise you’re not the only one scared shitless about everything, Kiki. I still can’t believe all of it isn’t a horrible dream.”

The druid reached across to the rogue’s rough hands, now dangling from the elbows that rested on his knees. Vax instinctively interlocked their fingers together, his heartbeat starting to race. 

Keyleth may have been the most socially inept person ever, with a seeming perpetual foot stuck in her mouth, but she wasn’t stupid. The intimacy the two half-elves were sharing she treasured deeply, and was so very grateful for Vax’s warm presence in the night’s unprecedented chill. Her thumbs caressed slowly wherever they could reach. And then after a moment, she tugged on her grip and pulled Vax onto the bed. 

Allowing himself to be handled, Vax sunk into the mattress next to Keyleth, returning her questioning gaze. The green of her eyes felt especially brilliant in the night, something he hadn’t realised before. 

“What is it?”

Keyleth swallowed, gave a light squeeze to Vax’s palms. “Does it still hurt?”

“What does?”

“Your… mark.”

Vax thought for a second that Keyleth’s voice carried a different weight when she spoke of them. Of anything regarding his person really, there was a distinct shift in the cosmos that made the words tumbling out of her lips come packing more density than usual. And it wasn’t that she sounded strained or pressed to say anything, but he worried all the same that perhaps he’d been too hasty to confess his feelings, maybe he’d put unnecessary pressure on her already weighed down shoulders when he was only being true to his heart. Finally, he concluded that no, that truth was the same one as the day he professed in Whitestone Castle not altogether all that long ago. Vax’ildan loved Keyleth with all of his heart; in the grand scheme of things the realm of their insignificance as people did not matter to him, the only thing that mattered was offering her transparency by opening up this small window to his soul. Whether Keyleth wished to barge in the entrance or slam the doors instead on his proverbial heart and soul, all he could do was give her the key to unlock them. 

He squeezed back Kiki’s hands before answering, taking note of her irregular breathing at this point. “No, Vex’ahlia saw to the stinging, there’s no more pain.”

A sigh of relief, then, her eyebrows met, forming a crease above the bridge of her nose. “Why would you even want a scar like that Vax? There are easier ways to remove such a mark, less painful.”

“It’s not anything bad to want. To finally be rid of any connection to those bastards of the Clasp, to not be marked by an organisation that almost had my sister killed. I’d trade a million more searing handprints if it meant immediate release from those shackles.” 

Keyleth’s eyes glistened with tears, ready to burst at any moment, but she held them back as best she could. Vax had made a good point, if she were in his place she wouldn’t hesitate to break any bonds, no matter how small, to such a corrupt group. What’s more, she felt a swell of pride ignite in her stomach at how well Vax had handled them in the end. She nodded, a hint of a smile evident on her lips. 

Words were spent somewhat into the night, but nothing further on the Chroma Conclave, the Clasp, or anything else that would give the half-elves more headaches. Keyleth regaled Vax with some short stories of her childhood, of meandering in the woods and her time spent in the idyllic scenery, of conversations shared with the local wildlife she thought back on with fondness. In return, Vax smiled, listened with great interest and learned more about this side of her he never expected to know. He regarded each tale as a small gift, treasuring them in his heart, and asked questions when he deemed appropriate. 

Keyleth did not fully realise when she began drifting. It started with a yawn here and there, her eyelids drooping when Vax asked another question, and she remembered giving a half-hearted answer before her consciousness finally faded as her head was softly laid on her pillow by a guiding hand. 

_The land of dreams carried her into the grasp of steady arms; Keyleth was being rocked gently by the branches of an old oak tree swaying softly in the afternoon breeze. Early spring had come to the lands of the Air Ashari and the scents blossoming of wildflowers hung sweetly in the air. This would be the last spring she’d get to spend with her people, the last few weeks before the start of her Aramenté, and an end to life as she knew it. Sunlight streaked through the branches and leaves towering above her, warming her face and hands. It felt a bittersweet moment, the ending of childhood, so present and palpable she could taste it in honey and the feel of leather against her skin._

_However, if she were being truly honest with herself, Keyleth would admit that the true ending to her innocence had come at the same time her mother left for her own Aramenté many years ago. She closed her eyes, feeling the breeze rock her particular branch and the warm sunlight above, thinking of her mother, wondering if she felt the same anxieties that now plagued the young druid at such a crucial period, if she would ever be able to rise to the occasion in the same stoic way. A big leaf snapped from an above branch, slowly swooped down and landed on the tip of her nose, its instant coldness contrasting with the sun’s rays, and the druid soon became restless under the strain of it._

Keyleth’s eyes fluttered open then, first seeing the breath escape her mouth followed by a numb sensation in her nose. Keyleth had the covers drawn to her shoulders but she instinctively reached across beneath them, finding the right side to her bed vacant and cold. She moved to sit upright, scanning about her bedroom at Greyskull Keep. For a moment or two, Keyleth wasn’t sure what she had been looking for, but her eyes eventually adjusted to the darkness and stillness of the room.

Vax’ildan, her Vax, sat upright at the foot of the bed, facing away from her. His long dark hair fell loose over his shoulders, no braids to keep it from obstructing his view like he usually wore. Keyleth had never seen it this untamed before, and acting on impulse she extended her hand and placed it gingerly in the space between the rogue’s shoulder blades to feel it. Vax’s whole body seemed to react, tensing under her touch, but said nothing until her eyes trained down on the exact placement of her fingers. 

“Can’t sleep?”

“Hardly,” he laughed quietly, shrugging his shoulders. 

“May I see?” 

Vax turned around to face Keyleth, breaking her hold on his back. “Why?”

“I want to see what a Vax’ildan that is free looks like,” she gulped, her airways feeling a little too constricted, “a Vax that has to answer to no one but himself.”

They held their mutual gaze for a while. To Vax, Keyleth may as well have been peering into his bare soul at that moment, and he wasn’t sure why it felt so intimate. Maybe the act of being here, in Kiki’s own bed at night, getting to spend the said night with the woman he most yearned for, had less to do with it than the burning intensity of her words. He reached for the back on his shirt and tugged it over his head, exposing his back once again to her direction.

Keyleth could not help the gasp that escaped her lips. The outline of Vax’s back was now lightly illuminated by the moonlight passing through the window, lending her a clearer view than before. Beneath a mass of black hair, the fresh handprint could be seen in the space the Clasp’s tattoo once occupied. She moved forwards on her knees, close enough for Vax to feel warm breath on his shoulders, setting aside the soft mane with one hand and with her right hand, perfectly aligning her fingers above their singed and scarred outlines. The warmth of her palm struck a chord through his very being and he closed his eyes to internalise it, guard it in his memory forever.

Keyleth then placed such reverent kisses across Vax’s shoulders and neck, never removing her right hand from place, that the hair on his arms stood on end. He bit on his lower lip, unable to predict what he might say, or moan out loud and have to look at her in the eyes afterwards. 

“Thank you for today,” Keyleth said, finally releasing her intoxicating hold. “Let’s try to get some sleep.”

Wordlessly the pair moved beneath the sheets, Vax covering them back up once they settled. He held onto Keyleth, embracing her frame and tucking his chin under her forehead. With her in his arms, his heartbeat eventually calming, he knew the Chroma Conclave didn’t stand a chance.

**Author's Note:**

> I legitimately have no idea what I'm doing. I watched episodes 44 & 45 these days for the first time and I'm left reeling. I haven't read any CR fanfic before so I have no idea how many people obsessed over the handprint scene besides me, but I hope it's a lot, because I'll be searching for them now. Thank you for reading!


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